The Hidden One

Wherever we turn in God‘s Word, we are going to find the story of the Cross presented in various types and figures. The rock that Moses struck in the wilderness is a very clear type of Jesus, smitten by God because of our sins. We can also see the reference to the Crucified Lord when Jehovah said to Moses, “I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and cover you with my hand until I have passed by” (Exodus 33:22).

So we can easily recognize the same reference to the Cross as the King seems to be turning the maiden‘s eyes to Calvary, and showing her that she is hidden in his wounded side, “united with him in his death” (Romans 6:5).

She has known him as her Indwelling King; she has had little glimpses of the Cross, and even agreed to follow him in the pathway of the Cross. However, she has not fully grasped the reality of her position as being buried with Him by baptism into His death. Her old life still holds its claim over here. She must learn that the cross stands between her and the world. She has died in her Redeemer, in order to be joined to him in his resurrection life.

It is because we do not understand the two aspects of crucifixion with Christ that we fail to realize abundant life in practical experience in our own lives.

The objective, or the actual finished work of Christ in his death and resurrection, is the basis of the subjective work of the Holy Spirit in us.

Objectively, the death of Christ was not just a propitiation for sin, but was, in God‘s mind, the death of every one that was under the domain of Satan.

In our position before God we, who have believed on Jesus, are in him, the Cleft Rock, united in his death. He became a curse for those that were under the curse, “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us” (II Corinthians 5:21) so that our accursed Adamic nature would be nailed to the Cross with our Substitute, the perfect Lamb of God. We actually died on the Cross!

Subjectively, it is the work of the Holy Spirit to apply to us the power of Christ’s death and resurrection in order to bring us into correspondence with our position in Christ — crucified, buried, raised and ascended with Christ.

“God made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions and raised us up with Christ and seated us with Him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:5,6).

Do you always act as though you are seated with Christ in the heavenly realms? No? It is the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives to put the objective truth into practice subjectively. If life-out-of-death is going to be known in practical reality, we must see the reality of both the objective and subjective aspects of our redemption.

I could do a whole series of teachings explaining the difference between positional truth and temporal truth. Simply stated, your position is where you are in the eyes of God: seated with Christ Jesus in the heavenly places for instance; or the fact that you are the very righteousness of God in Christ Jesus, but do you always act righteous? No. However, does that change your position? No, you are still seated with him.

Scripture teaches that the Love of God is within our heart. Do you always act loving? No? Well, that does not change the fact that the love is still there. You simply need to allow the Holy Spirit to develop that area of your life. It is the work of the Holy Spirit to form and shape our lives in order to correspond with our position.

On our part, if we have been brought by the mercy of God to truly hate ourselves — our own life (Luke 14:26) as well as our sins — and are willing to renounce all that we have, we can turn to Calvary. In doing so, we will see that in Christ we are delivered, “being dead to what once bound us, we are now released” (Romans 7:6).

In our dependence on the Holy Spirit, we can appropriate the death of Christ as our death, and count on the immediate inflow of the life of the Risen Lord to possess us to the fullest capacity of our earthen vessel. “Where sin once abounded, grace does much more abound.” We can expect the Holy Spirit to bear witness and help us put to death the works of the flesh. This will come in ever-increasing power, while he continues to teach us to hate the garments spotted by the flesh and to glory in the Cross.

The Holy Spirit is charged with this work of communicating the resurrection life of Christ. He will always cause us to bear about the dying of Jesus to manifest the life of Jesus in our mortal flesh, and in the power of that eternal life, energized to work out our salvation with fear and trembling.

“When our Lord looked at us, He saw not only what we were—He was faithful in seeing what we could become! He took away the curse of being and gave us the glorious blessing of becoming.” –A.W. Tozer, Who Put Jesus on the Cross

The King reminds the maiden of her place in the cleft of the rock; because that is the only way he can recognize her.
The Lord took Adam‘s bride out of his side during his sleep; made her out of his own nature and presented to him by her creator. What a beautiful foreshadowing of the mystery of Christ and his Church!

We were planted into Jesus, the second Adam, as he hung on the Cross of Calvary and became a curse for us. “One died for all, and therefore all died” (II Corinthians 5:14). There we are; planted in him, baptized into his death, emerging as his Bride, formed by many members, taken out of his side during the sleep of death, partaking of his nature, and eventually to be presented to him to share his throne.

He raises the poor out of the dust and lifts up the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with the noble, and inherit the throne of glory” —I Samuel 2:8.

“Then I looked, and there before me was the Lamb standing on Mount Zion and with him” those “who had His name and His Father‘s name written on their foreheads (or having their minds renewed) . . . those who did not defile themselves with women for they are pure‖ (or separated from a harlot system; see II Corinthians 11:2-3; Hosea 2:19-20).

“They follow the Lamb wherever He goes” (see John 1:18). They were offered as first fruits to God and the Lamb (see: James 1:18).

“No lie was found on their lips; they are blameless” —Revelations 14:1, 4-5.

He tells his maiden to turn her face toward him and to let him hear her voice in joyful response to his call. He sees that her eyes are looking in the wrong direction. He had drawn her attention from all the outward things, to his manifested presence at the center of her heart; ―the hope of Glory, Christ in you‖ he said; but now he wants her to turn toward him, not as in her heart—although he is there—but as his being at his Father‘s right hand.

She has been bought with his blood and so her voice is sweet to his ears. He loves to see her gaze at him like a sunflower follows the sun, or as the moon at nighttime reflects the light of the unseen light of the day.